"And I think we should leave it there for the moment," Dedue suggested. "It is nearly lunch time."
As everyone left the meeting room, Edelgard and Claude took a detour into one of the other rooms, and closed the door after making sure there was no one else within. Claude noticed that Edelgard was ever-so-slightly shifting constantly. "Be patient, Edelgard," he reminded her.
"I know," Edelgard said.
Dealing with Rhea as a neutral party the two of them wanted to avoid making an enemy of was complicated. Edelgard knew that they wanted her to support them, or at least not oppose them, in a lot of endeavors that ran counter to what she historically supported. If they simply asked her for everything they wanted from her at this point, or worse, demanded all of it, she wouldn't respond to it well. They had to open with small requests, gradually begin asking for more, and steer her into making decisions favorable to their goals. It wasn't manipulation, as it was for Rhea's own good as much as anyone else's, but there was some overlap with the concept.
Maybe that was how Claude liked doing things, but it didn't come naturally to Edelgard. "I feel like I'm wasting time."
"Edelgard, it's been less than a moon," Claude said. "And we've already gotten Rhea to agree to more than we expected she ever would before Hyrule."
"I know," Edelgard said. "Logically, I know challenging her stances head-on will only cause her to become defensive and will make it harder to convince her of anything. But this is your way of getting what you want, not mine."
"Are you mad at her?" Claude asked.
"Her? No," Edelgard said. "Not now that I've come to understand that she's less the tyrant trying to make slaves of humanity and more the abused woman trying and failing to change human nature in the same way a battered wife might try and fail to change a cruel husband."
Claude frowned slightly. "Then...what?"
Edelgard sighed. "I suppose...I'm frustrated that she hasn't managed to change human nature. And afraid that she couldn't change human nature because human nature does not change."
"You're afraid everything we're working towards is pointless," Claude realized.
"Yes," Edelgard said. "Even if we do succeed at everything we're working towards...how long will it last? How long until new political ideologies become corrupted, twisted until they are as tyrannical as the old ones? How long until the friendships we build between nations turn sour?
"But even if it all didn't last long, I thought it was all still worth it," Edelgard elaborated. "It could serve as an experiment, a basis to improve upon. A step on the ladder towards enlightenment for humanity. But what if the top of the ladder doesn't exist? What if it is not a ladder but a wheel, and humanity is doomed to repeat the same mistakes for all time? Or worse, what if Krios was right? What if the end of humanity's quest to better itself only leads to humanity's self-destruction?"
"You didn't have worries like this in Hyrule," Claude said neutrally.
"But that was Hyrule," Edelgard responded. "Hyrule isn't really a place where human nature as we understand it reigns supreme. It's a land of the divine; the realities of human nature come second there. And it managed to destroy itself multiple times anyway. I'm not blind to everything we've already accomplished. We saved the world, we prevented a massacre twice over, we overthrew a dark lord, and we broke his crown so no one could ever wear it again. But..."
Claude understood what she was getting at. "You're wondering if we might have set our sights too high."
"I can't say I've ever put much stock in fate," Edelgard said. "But I do believe that hubris has a way of destroying a person. I'm not saying we should stop; obviously we need to put the remains of the Agarthan Empire out of its misery, but I can't help but wonder if we aren't sowing the seeds of our own Agarthan Empire. You remember what Cato had to say about it."
"Honestly, I tuned out most of his rambling," Claude admitted. "I'm sure he had plenty of interesting things to say about philosophy, if you had the patience to sift through his weird metaphors. But I do remember the last thing he told us."
"I haven't forgotten," Edelgard assured him. "I'm not going to forget what I stand for. And I'm going to wear my symbols with pride. But I do have to wonder how long they'll be my symbols, for how long they'll represent something that I can be proud of."
"Edie, we're human," Claude said. "The Nabateans created a civilization that would have never changed if the Agarthans and Nemesis hadn't happened. But no matter how perfect it was for them, we couldn't have lived under it. It wouldn't have been right for us. There is no perfect civilization for humanity. And you know what? There never will be. Even if we go to heaven, that civilization will only be perfect for us because death will have fundamentally changed what we are."
"Don't you mean 'when' we go to heaven?" she joked.
"No, I can think of a few reasons for 'if'," Claude admitted. "My point is, human civilizations don't last forever. And they shouldn't. Humanity needs to grow, to advance, and to regress if we have to. We can't remain stagnant. That's the worst thing that can happen to us. Even if our endless struggle to improve ourselves never actually leads us to becoming any better, we can at least find meaning in the struggle itself. We can't find meaning in stagnation."
"And if that path really does lead to us destroying ourselves?" Edelgard asked.
"Then that's how our story ends," Claude said. "But at least humanity will have been what it was meant to be. If it has to die for that, that's what it will do."
"Let's hope there will still be someone left who will remember us if that happens, then," Edelgard said. "I think I do feel better now."
"Good, because I'm hungry," Claude said. "Let's hope there's still some of the good food left." With that, the two of them went to join the others at the dining hall.